Facebook Watch: "Is Facebook worth your time?" (David Kirkpatrick)

Here is another fine column about facebook from David Kirkpatrick, FORTUNE senior editor. David offers some interesting observations about the News Feed feature:

".... Facebook is different from the many social networks that preceded it for two primary reasons. First, it requires you to join under your real name and use real information about where you live and work, what your interests are, and so on.

But the second, less-understood differentiator in today's Facebook is a feature called the News Feed. You see your individualized News Feed each time you log in. Getting it to work for you is key for an adult to have a satisfying Facebook experience, and has everything to do with having enough friends.

The News Feed is a list of "news" about your friends' activities and behavior. One friend may have joined a group protesting the Zimbabwe election count delay. Another has become friends with someone else you know. One has posted photos of his trip to Spain. Someone has become a "fan" of The New Yorker magazine. A friend is attending a party on Saturday night. And so on. Some of these "news" alerts may impel you to click on them to look at the photos, or learn more about a group, a party, or some other aspect of your friend's activities. This is the launching point for much of a typical member's Facebook activity.

What makes the Facebook News Feed unlike any other communications tool that preceded it is that none of these friends explicitly said they wanted you to get this information. Instead, it came to you because Facebook's software has concluded, by sophisticated algorithmic means, that you are likely to be interested.

For the News Feed to work properly though, you need to have a fair number of Facebook friends and you need to regularly do things inside Facebook. And it is on that score that many adults fall down."

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